Helena Ngaifiwa is named after her father’s mother. She was born in the small coastal town of Arandis and was raised by her father in Swakopmund. She attended the Atlantic Primary School and moved to West Side High for her Grade Six until Grade 12.
“I grew up with my father and two alien brothers. I took part in my first beauty pageant when I was at Atlantic where I won Ms. Spring. During my high school years I enjoyed running the 100 metre sprint and the 4×100 metre relay.” Helena was appointed as a Student Representative Council (SRC) and during her term ran a school magazine, organised various functions and was tasked to deal with a lot of gender issues. She was involved in a lot of public speaking and was part of ‘My Future Is My Choice’ and HIV and AIDS groups. When she finished her twelfth grade, Helena really wanted to do Media Studies but her family did not agree so she took a gap year to rethink what she would study. “In my gap year I started doing a lot of youth activities with the National Youth Service (NYS) and d a lot of master of ceremony (MC) gigs. I started of MC’ing at small beauty pageants which I would organise with my two friends.”
Helena’s big break came when Vilho organised a gospel show in Swakopmund featuring various gospel artists like DNaff who was just starting his musical career at the time. A nervous Helena mcd at the show after which she was approached by a Trinity Broadcasting Network (TBN) producer if she was interested being on television. Over the moon, she said yes and gave him her number. Helena was soon contacted by the producer and after auditions, she landed the job and was the presenter of the local gospel show called Ya’rocka. After a year the show stopped but only to continue on the Namibian Broadcasting Corporation (NBC) television with her. “Working at TBN literally changed my life as people started recognising me and some looking up to me and the show had so much meaning as the show touched and changed a lot of lives.”
In the December holidays of 2009, Zocks, Helena’s friend approached her with a MC gig where she teamed up with longtime friend, Pombili, for the Gazza’s Shikusha album launch in Walvis Bay. The arena was packed and this was Helena’s first big function.
Looking for a new challenge in life, she moved to Windhoek in 2010 and not long after, found employment with the Namibia Music Union. she would then team up with DJ Remind who would arrange MC gigs for her through his events management company.
In 2011 an opportunity presented itself at Radio Energy when auditions for news anchor at the radio station came up. Helena heard of the auditions and attended. She landed the job but things soon went horribly wrong when Helena would freeze on air while presenting the news. This went on for a week before Helena was called in by the manager, and to her surprise instead of being fired the manager offered to move her where she would co-host with someone.
‘I cohosted Local Attack with Ms.Bee which went much better then reading the news. I guess because it was much more relaxed and you are talking instead of reading. After some time I started hosting Local Attack on my own.”
Helena soon found full time employment at Omalaeti Events as an events coordinator where she learned how to coordinate and organise events, workshops and shows. Towards the end of 2011, she was asked to stand in for a fellow DJ on a Sunday show, which she accepted, and fell in love with it as it as something different and calmer then her current show at the time.
Helena soon found herself doing The Essential Lounge show on Mondays to Thursdays lunch time and the Total Control show on Sundays before moving to the Love Zone late Sunday nights. The Love Zone is not just a music show but Helena connects to her listeners giving them relationship advice, tips and debates certain issues. In Mid -2012 Helena landed a job at One Africa Television as a news anchor but only after attending auditions twice as she freaked out and left the first time around. She was contacted two weeks later informing her she had landed the job and has been growing from strength to strength and has not looked back ever since.
“I have a son called Panduleni who is very naughty but started Grade One this year. It is a constant fight to get him out of bed in the mornings but he is my baby. I only get to see the 10 O’clock news bulletin so when the clock strikes ten at my house the channel is changed and we watch the news together.”
Helena has since left The Essential Lounge show but continues to do the Love Zone show out of pure love for the show at Energy 100FM and has left Energy to concentrate on her company called Creative Events with her business partner Willemina. They organise and manage weddings, gala dinners, workshops, conferences and other corporate events. Her company is currently managing a project on behalf of The Namibian Careers Expo, running and organising the career expo. This year she will be launching the expo in the north of Namibia, which will be a first for them, followed by the local expo in Windhoek.
Creative Events is also responsible for a gala dinner that raising funds for students scholarships from disadvantaged backgrounds. Creative Events also interact with different schools by keeping in touch with their life skills teachers and source different professionals to visit the schools and educate these students on their professions. The company goes one step further and organise breakfast sessions where a school selects ten students to meet personalities over breakfast.
Funny, beautiful and full of energy. But one thing that is not known about her apart from her business activities, it is that Helena has a big heart and over the years has founded a charity group with her friends called Put a smile on a child’s face that has helped numerous children and children’s homes by raising funds, donating and just spending time with the less privileged children .
Helena is planning on moving forward and growing bigger as a brand, professionally and in her personal life. Her advice to the youth is for them to “identify what you are good at, do not give up go out there and make things happen for yourself, believe in something and hold on to it as there is always hope. The only way you can change that circumstance is to influence your thinking and change your way of doing things. If you really want to do something do not be afraid go out there and do it.”
By Kevin Kamati